Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

They they be good in a mixed list say some foot some mech? How to get the best out of them?

I think that Avatar can find a place in every list... His CC capabilities are terrific!! Usually the opponent rigthly fear the possibility that such a monster hit his lines so it distract the fire from other units... The only problem is that it's vulnerable to massed light weapons fire in my opinion so maybe it's not the best choice against Guard or Orks... but I usually find it against my SM army so I'm not sure....

A friend of mine usually make a "bad guys team" composed by Avatar and 2 wraithlords to keep one side of his deployment

They usually fall but you can't ignore them so your fire is divided between the 3 monsters and the approaching wave serpents

I've seen the avatar fall to far too many things (including crap things) to respect it all. It is somewhat useful for the guardian Waaaagh! (dumb concept, but people play it), but generally it sucks for its points. A CC beatstick that can be singled out better be better for its points than what the avatar is. I've killed the thing with a SoB cannoness in CC, seen it die to PF sarges (including guard ones...), and removed it with a GK grand master.

I have never once seen it gets its points back or fill a vital role other than the handful of times it punched a tank to death (and that only happened because the tanks where immobilized/stunned).

I run the avatar in my mech list and have had good experiences using him. I think for the point cost he takes a lot of damage and can put out enough wounds to be effective. Fortune helps if you decide to take him crowd surfing in a swarm of Orks. How effective he is really depends on your list and the list you face. He does not do well against poison, force weapons and very mobile armies, but if you get an opponent to spend multiple turns shooting at him and not the rest of your army, then he is worth it.

The Avatar is a great unit if you use it right. I once had it cut through a venerable dreadnought, SM tac squad, Baneblade and 20 Imperial Guardsmen as well as almost killing Yarrick in one game (apoc).

For 155 points, the Avatar is cheap compared to other units of a similar type. You need to get him in assaults as often as possible. Pick on melta and flamer wielding squads, because you are invulnerable to those weapons. Use his meltagun to destroy tanks.

Surround him with infantry as most people do. If fielding in a mech list, make sure you have other units to distract from him.

Fortune him to see him shine.

With fortune on, his save is statistically better than a termie with a storm shield... which is pretty nice considering your T6, you should be able to take alot of damage. If your area also runs alot of meltas, you'll be laughing. Yes, hes slow... but with the running and MTC rules, he can still hoof it around the board at a reasonable pace and you can't ignore him for too long.

Also... for 155 points hes not that much more expensive that a wave serpent, and is highly more durable. Any shots going his way is a good thing, even if he dies hes doing his job.

The problem with the Avatar, as well as most Monstrous Creatures, is that it attracts a lot of attention. (Which can be a pro as as a con, but we'll go over that later). Immunity to Melta and Flame weapons is nice, but with only a 4+ Invul Save, don't expect it to live long, especially if you're not in CC.

Being in CC is where it thrives, and the trick is to get it into CC ASAP. I would run him behind Wave Serpents, and follow them closely until you're close enough to get into CC. Give him as much cover as you can, and hope he survives long enough to get into combat.

On the plus side, it helps if you're opponent is focusing on him, if you have another unit that can prove to be just as devastating (whichever unit that may be).

I've only played him once, and while I did win that game, he did die by Turn 4. Granted, it took close to 20 marines jumping on him, but I killed 17 marines with him before it died.

I'd agree about the fortune on him.

My Avatar goes down too quickly when fortune gets switched off.

A lot of games he's my most valuable asset.

Important to note that if you have to fortune him to make him useful you aren't really spending 155 points on the avatar, you're spending 300+ on some amalgamated farseer+avatar combo (a combo that is unlikely to do anything against most good armies)

As some people have mentioned, he's vulnerable to small-arms fire. In a mech list, that small-arms fire won't have anything else to target, so he's going down. Then again, my only real experience of the Avatar was a friend who played another friend. 10 Chaos Space Marines rapid fired bolters and killed him. Sure, bad luck, but it can and will happen eventually.

And i've killed mephy with guardians... doesn't mean you should expect it every game...
Yes, he is vulnerable to small arms, but for small arms fire to work effectivly they need to get within 12", which is generally not the best place to be if you fail to kill the avatar.
I'm more concerned over his inability to catch anything, if the enemy mechs up or simply moves away they can escape combay indefinetly.

What sort of small arms fire are we talking about here? Walrus mentioned rapid firing chaos marines, but how unlucky do you need to be to go down to bolter fire?
on ave, you need 27 shots to do one full wound on an Avatar - (27 shots, 3's to hit is 18 hits, 6's to wound is 3 wounds, 3+ save is 1 full wound on average). That's a total of 108 bolter rounds (54 rapid firing) to do 4 full wounds on average, and we're not even fortuning the Avatar yet. A fully fortuned Avatar will take (again on average) 324 bolter shots (or 162 rapid fired) before he loses a full four wounds.

Now I know these are just averages, and I know that Avatars (like any other awesome HQ,MC, etc) have gone down to small arms fire and it's a pain when it happens.

The truth is so that (on average) you'll also have games swing the other way - like when I completely failed to bring down an ork warboss in mega army despite hitting him with around 16 guided scatter laser shots, 3 singing spear shots, 2 x 10 man volleys from a DA squad, a EML from a WL, a charge from my WL (which he sunsequently killed in one go with his Pfist despite my WL being unwounded at that stage - jammy git), and a final last ditch charge from my DA's and Farseer to try and get that last wound (which we failed to do). Oh, and his Warboss had actually taken his first two wounds before all this, so that entire volley of fire failed to cause a single wound. <end rant>

I suppose my point is, you would have to be very unlucky to lose an Avatar to light arms fire, and you shouldn't not take a unit just because if you are really unlucky, it will die - because the same can be said for just about any unit in the game. And, if you're lucky, your Avatar might just take on all your opponents guns and allow your Serpents, Walkers, Jetbikes, DA's or whatever else you may have go unscathed for the first few turns of the game )

just my 2 cents.

If my math is correct 27 bolter shots has about a 64.7% chance of doing at least one wound to an avatar. "On Average I will do (insert tons of simple division here)" is rarely worth using, if ever.

I think that "On average I will do..." is useful as a base of reference only, I would agree that it's not really useful to plan your army/strategy around.

My point (probably lost in the tons of simple division) was more to illustarte that the Avatar is actually really tough to kill with small arms fire, and although it can happen if your opponent is really lucky (or you're really unlucky), this should not be the basis of a decision not to take the Avatar.

A decision to take (or not take) the Avatar should be based primarily around army synergy, what your armies strengths/weaknesses are, what type of army you want to build, what models you like using etc. not whether some random act could kill your Avatar easily.

Well, the original question was "is he worth it only in footslogging armies, or also in mech?" Debating about whether he's worth it at all isn't really helpng .

So, assuming he is worth it, how would you see him included or excluded in a mech army?

If you play the Avatar as an eldar player, you must not face space wolves or IG very much.

Lord Rogukiel wrote:Well, the original question was "is he worth it only in footslogging armies, or also in mech?" Debating about whether he's worth it at all isn't really helpng .

So, assuming he is worth it, how would you see him included or excluded in a mech army?

Footslogging and hybrid. In full mech the weapons that will be useless against the vehicles will have nothing else to really target. Plus he'll get left behind the entire army, or you'll have to slow down for it.